Right Here Waiting
by Soul Reaver
Summary: What if Sturgis appeared two seasons earlier? He shows Mac one of Harm's hidden talents shortly after Boomerang. Challenge fic enclosed....Please R


Right Here Waiting  
  
Disclaimer: Don't own JAG or Harm and Mac would already be celebrating their anniversary right now. I don't own Richard Marx's Right here waiting lyrics. This takes place any time after the episode Boomerang up to the episode Lifeline. There is a challenge: I will only write up to the end of this fic. I challenge you, my readers to write of Mac's reaction to this....(setting can vary from right after the song to any time afterward). Yes I know Sturgis didn't come in until 7th season, this is an AU fic where Sturgis came in two seasons earlier.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~  
  
"Encore! Encore!" The crowd cheered the singer standing on the stage at karaoke bar.  
  
"If you insist." The singer said, with a sad smile. He was a dark haired fellow with clear, ice blue eyes that concealed a great sadness that only came forth with his song. He lurched into an excellent rendition of a song the crowd shouted for him to sing, In the Still of the Night.  
  
Sturgis Turner watched from the bar as his friend sang his heart out on the stage. Harm was really taking Mac's engagement to Mic very badly. He may have hidden it well at the office or whenever they'd talk, but when Harm would sing it bared all the emotions within. It might hurt her, but Mac had to know, and Sturgis knew that next Wednesday night would be perfect, even if he had to go behind Harm's back for this one.  
  
~ ~ ~ ~  
  
One week later:  
  
Sarah Mackenzie answered the door at her apartment. To her surprise, she saw Sturgis standing there. "What's the occasion?" Mac smiled, startled.  
  
"Sarah, how would you feel if I said Harm has a surprise for you." Sturgis replied, "Dress casual."  
  
"Really, what is it?" Mac asked.  
  
"You'll find out soon enough, but if you don't get downstairs in about an hour you won't know." Sturgis replied.  
  
Mac got dressed, showered and cleaned up. She wore a red turtleneck sweater, a pair of blue jeans that hugged her figure just right, and a good pair of shoes together with a red fleece jacket. She grabbed her purse and met Sturgis at his car.  
  
"Where are we going?" Mac asked.  
  
"You'll see." Sturgis replied.  
  
As they drove down the Beltway and into a Washington DC karaoke bar Mac asked, "Karaoke? I didn't know Harm could sing."  
  
"There's a lot about him you don't know." Sturgis began. They walked inside and took a seat as close enough to the front as they could muster.  
  
Sturgis checked his watch as the crowd shouted, "Rabb! Rabb! Rabb!"  
  
Sarah's heart stopped momentarily when she saw him. Harm walked on stage, wearing blue jeans, a light green button down shirt with his leather flight jacket worn over it. He tapped the mike, unaware that his inspiration was in the audience.  
  
"This one's dedicated to one very special lady." Harm began, "She inspired my other act last week. Though her heart is with a man across the sea, she'll always have a special place in me."  
  
Harm then began to sing out his emotions, raw and unfettered from deep within his heart, "Oceans apart day after day. And I slowly go insane. I hear your voice on the line. But it doesn't stop the pain."  
  
Mac watched him silently as Harm's defenses and facades began to crumble and fade away, revealing everything underneath that he had felt before and since a certain ferry ride in Australia.  
  
"If I see you next to never. How can we say forever." Harm continued, closing his eyes and blinking unshed tears away.  
  
Mac stared at the engagement ring on her finger. One could never think that a small item of diamond and gold could cause another so much angst. Harm lost entirely the guarded outside he showed on a daily basis, and instead Harmon Rabb Junior's soul was laid bare in front of an audience. Sarah did forget that Sturgis and the rest of the audience was there, Harm's singing was so earnest and heartfelt that it hypnotized her.  
  
"Wherever you go. Whatever you do. I will be right here waiting for you. Whatever it takes. Or how my heart breaks. I will be right here waiting for you." Harm began.  
  
"The man's got some talent." Said a woman from an adjacent table, "I wonder why she didn't choose him, he seems nice enough."  
  
Her companion replied, "She's such a rake for letting him go through all this."  
  
"I wish she could see just one of his acts, hear just one song." The first woman replied, "It would easily change her mind."  
  
Little did the two women know that the very person they talked of was sitting in there beside them.  
  
"I took for granted, all the times. That I though would last somehow. I hear the laughter, I taste the tears. But I can't get near you now." Harm continued on.  
  
Sarah's heart pulsed again, she could feel it contracting as she remembered a kiss in Norfolk they shared. Where Harm seemed to be kissing his lost Academy sweetheart, but now she could see he wasn't just kissing Diane's ghost.  
  
"Get over it dude! She's not worth it!" a man shouted.  
  
"Hey shut up and let him finish asshole!" Mac heard another man shout at him.  
  
"He's being such a pansy over this chick. He should tell her how he feels!" the heckler continued.  
  
The heckler walked by their table and Mac jammed her right leg between the drunk's feet and he hit the floor with a loud crash. The man was telling her how he felt, or was he?  
  
"Oh, can't you see it baby. You've got me goin' crazy." Harm continued on, as he sang he noticed a heckler lying face down after being tripped. He saw a woman sitting at a table, and couldn't help but notice she looked like Mac, a lot like her. His performance became even more impassioned as he sang out, "Wherever you go. Whatever you do. I will be right here waiting for you. Whatever it takes. Or how my heart breaks. I will be right here waiting for you."  
  
Harm remembered a ferry ride back in Sydney. He remembered seeing her wearing Mic's engagement ring and seeing their embrace. It was all he could do not to stalk off and let it all out. If only he could have the courage to invite Mac to one of these acts of his, she would see what was inside. Little did he know Sturgis was ahead of the game plan.  
  
"I wonder how we can survive. This romance. But in the end if I'm with you. I'll take the chance." Harm continued. Why is it he could sing his love for Sarah in front of total strangers, but not tell Sarah herself how he really felt?  
  
Sturgis watched Mac grow mesmerized by Harm's impassioned singing. He could see tears forming in her eyes, and she was making no motion to wipe them away from her face. A single, solitary crystalline drop formed on her right eye.  
  
"Oh, can't you see it baby. You've got me goin' crazy." Harm continued on, his eyes coming to rest on the young woman in the red sweater.  
  
"Wherever you go. Whatever you do. I will be right here waiting for you. Whatever it takes. Or how my heart breaks. I will be right here waiting for you." Harm sang and at that moment his eyes locked with the woman in the red sweater and he realized he had been singing to Sarah all this time....  
  
~ ~ ~ ~  
  
That's where you come in readers. Write of Sarah's reaction to this song, if any. Be as creative as you like, that is my challenge. 


End file.
